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<p><SPAN class="panel-title"> How the Style of Writing Can Make a Book Readable -- BayCon 2012 </SPAN> <SPAN class="dateline"> 26.05.2012 11.30h </SPAN></p>
<ul class="taglist">
<li class="tags">
Style
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<li class="tags">
Craft
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<li class="tags">
Point of View
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<li class="tags">
Voice
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</ul>

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<DIV class="intro">
First person? Omniscient? First-person smart aleck? A discussion of how and why the point of view changes our liking or disliking of a storyline. How does the way authors convey their story, film noir, western, fairytale, tall tale, all come together or fall apart for the reader?
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<DIV class="panelists">
<ul>
<li><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaz_Brenchley">Chaz Brenchley</a> - Chaz</li>
<li><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brandon_Sanderson">Brandon Sanderson</a> - Brandon</li>
<li><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_Kaathryn_Bohnhoff">Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff</a> - Maya</li>
<li><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diana_Paxson">Dianna Paxon</a> - Diana</li>
<li><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Dario-Ciriello/e/B002UF67GY">Dario Ciriello</a> - Dario</li>
<li><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norm_Sperling">Norm Sperling</a> - Norm
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</ul>
<h3 id="notes">Notes</h3>
<div class="notes">
<p>Diana: Writing pretty is not all you need to tell a story</p>
<p>Viewpoint: Omniscient vs. Limited, 1st person vs. 3rd person</p>
<p>Chaz: About feeling. 1st person unreliable is more plausible (me: how people actually behave?) Dario: In using 1st person, you must reist the temptation to ramble. And just because POV doesn't die, can go through a LOT. Brandon: 1st person is the default in YA.</p>
<p>1st person is more intense and immediate.</p>
<p>Maya: some editors and agents don't like 1st person, but it is popular with readers, especially 1st person, present tense. But some writers forget that you can only show what the character can see/hear/feel/smell etc. It might be easier to stay with 3rd person.</p>
<p>Dario: length can POV, 1st person is shorter, as there's less that can be conveyed. The more POV characters there, the longer the work.</p>
<p>Brandon: Work can be tighter and stronger with fewer POV characters. First person is more immediate, and easiest to make a strong character voice. It lets you 'cheat' on info dumps, as character moments. First person is worse for multiple viewpoints, you get 'head hopping' (risk of reader confusion, at best choppy/disjointed)</p>
<p>Norm: Write it how <b>that</b> story needs it.</p>
<p>Dario: An advantage to 3rd person is that the character can show more what s/he doesn't 'groove' on, which 1st might omit.</p>
<p>3rd person limited didn't come into force until about '82. It can bring some strengths.</p>
<p>Omniscient passages out of the blue break the 4th wall.</p>
<p>In 3rd person, it is harder to tell if you are showing. Try as an exercise, rewriting a 3rd person passage in 1st person to see if you are breaking POV.</p>
<p>Readers can find it easier to be in the character's head if written in 3rd over 1st. A strong voice makes it harder to get into the character's head.</p>
<p>Maya: Quirkiness can become tiresome if not well handled. A bland character can sometimes make a good point of view character.</p>
<p>Dario: it is logistically easier with 3rd person. And good writing still <u>can</u> get that level of voice.</p>
<p>Brandon: know your genre convention. Epic fantasy is usually 3rd, YA is 1st. Literary works, tense is present. Default to your genre convention.</p>
<p>Describing your main character, you might need to resort to subterfuge in 1st person, it is easier in 3rd. You can also make the protagonist more compelling in 3rd person.</p>
<h3 id="limited-v.-omniscient"><b>Limited v. Omniscient</b></h3>
<p>Limited 3rd vs. Omniscient 3rd.</p>
<p>True omniscient, no limit to POV, vs. more limited omniscient where it is only the narrator who is omniscient vs. limited 3rd per scene/chapter, which in character's head, is as limtied as 1st person. Omniscient doesn't get the character into 'the Dream' as deeply.</p>
<p>Omniscient interjections can be used (sparsely)</p>
<p>In limited, in every new scene, the reader must know who is the viewpoint character.</p>
<p>Thrillers often break POV: &quot;What Robert didn't know was ...&quot;</p>
<p>Manage your tension. There's a different kind of tension in omniscient. What's most important?</p>
<p>A lot of writing is figuring out the strategies to do what you need to do.</p>
<p>Every section must do as much as possible. Looking at the narrative, you should be able to tell a lot about the character.</p>
<p>Advantages of 3rd limited over 1st? You can change the POV per scene more readily. Also, 3rd limited is more trustworthy.</p>
<h3 id="present-vs.-past"><b>Present vs. Past</b></h3>
<p>Chose your own adventure novels are usually the only ones written in the present tense.</p>
<p>Chaz: Storytelling mode works best in the past.</p>
<p>Dario: Literary is often in the present, but genre readers see it as pretentious. Switching present to the past is <em>hard</em>.</p>
<p>Maya: tense comes at the same time as voice. Writer must pay very careful attention to tense/verbs.</p>
<p>Brandon: What is not invisible is a switch, something not expected. Use such only intentionally, as a tool.</p>
<p>Write in your genre's convention, unless you have a strong reason not to.</p>
<h3 id="other-style-issues"><b>Other Style issues</b></h3>
<p>Use slang in novels sparingly. You must be careful with the accent. Use a little, but do more with rhythm.</p>
<p>Be selective in what you do but do it boldly.</p>
<p>Within 1st person, there's 1st person immediate, you are watching what's happening, or 1st person after the fact -- Epistelary (Journal Entries)</p>
<p>Chaz: Switching between 1st and 3rd, is &quot;cheating&quot; -- distorting and dishonest. It's OK if the first is epistelary, or if 3rd is omniscient. It is most jarring if the 3rd is limited and immediate.</p>
<p>A character's personality shades everything. Humans assign values to everything, even random strings of letters.</p>
<p>Ray Bradbury: For the first draft, don't think, just write, get down the bones. What happened first, then how it happened.</p>
<h3 id="multiple-povs-vs.-a-single-pov">Multiple POVs vs. a Single POV</h3>
<h3 id="unaddressed-issues">Unaddressed issues</h3>
<p>Active narrator vs. passive narrator</p>
<p>Structure</p>
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